Ranking points towards the official British Quiz Association (BQA) 'Order of Merit' and 'All Time UK Quiz Rankings' are garnered at live events run every month at various locations around the country. These include the British Quizzing Championships (BQC), standard BQA Grands Prix, the annual British Open Grand Prix, and the International Quizzing Assoc. (iQa) 'World Championships' (WQC). The last two, along with the iQa Europe 'European Quizzing Championships' (EQC) and Hot100 quizzes earn points for the World 'Order of Merit' and 'All Time World Quiz Rankings'.

Please see HERE for a fuller exposition on how the Order of Merit and BQA Rankings work, and the history of their development.

The current UK Order of Merit can be viewed on the Quest database, chose the "Order of Merit" tab after clicking here.

The current UK All Time Rankings can be viewed on the Quest database, chose the "All Time Rankings" tab after clicking here.

The current World Order of Merit can be viewed on the Quest database, here.

Below this post, you can see a round-up of the 2017/18 season along with new ranks for the 2018/19 season that open with the 2018 British Quiz Championships (1 September 2018).

Thank you everyone who came out and supported the UK Quizzing Circuit! We are very pleased to post this annual Order of Merit Bulletin...

4 August 2018 saw the last UK Grand Prix Quiz of 2017/18, with the season’s final haul of rankings points for the UK Order of Merit. It’s important that we take stock at season end, not just because we want to acknowledge players’ achievements, but also because the pot of rankings points for the new season, will be calculated by reference to the newly adjusted Order of Merit ranks. So, let’s see how things panned-out at season end…

CHAMPION(S)As well as ending the season atop the UK All Time Rankings, and very comfortably so, Pat Gibson also topped the Order of Merit. We heartily congratulate him on that ‘Double’ achievement. He was able this season to garner 36,310 points, circa 97% of the available maximum, while the second placed player on the Order of Merit, Kevin Ashman (33,885), around 91%. That’s a huge lead Pat had over his fellow quiz legend. Similarly, on the ‘All Time’ chart, Pat stands at the apex of a pyramid containing more than 700 currently ranked players. Well done Pat!

ORDER OF MERITThe sum value of all the events qualifying for rankings points in season 2017/18 saw a Theoretical Maximum score of 37,084 (for interest sake, 10 years ago the total was 9630, about a quarter of what it is now - we had fewer events and a somewhat smaller field of players back then). So, that gave us the following targets/cut-off points for ranks as follows:

To be a Grand Master - 18,542 pointsTo be a Master - 11,125 pointsTo be a Candidate Master - 5,563 pointsTo be a Sage - 1,854 points, or a minimum of four events in totalAs always, the directors of the BQA have the power to promote a player (or preserve a rank that might otherwise be lost) in exceptional cases, especially with a good performance in the WQC or EQC. So the final outcomes are as follows:

Grand Masters Twelve of the 17 players maintain their Grand Master status on merit alone. Two the five GMs who might otherwise have become Masters are granted ‘directors dispensations’ as follows…

Olav Bjortomt – not in the best of health throughout, and he is reigning IQA World and Olympic Champion.Andy Tucker – attended only a minority of the circuit’s events while still convalescing after a major illness.

We congratulate Martin Wightman (19,412) and Ian Orriss (18,958), both of whom are promoted to Grand Master for the first time in their quizzing careers. Both richly deserve their elevation, and its good to see Martin made the cut even after circumstances led to his missing the WQC in June.

Commiserations to Anne Hegerty, Dave McBryan, and Oliver Levy who become Masters. We look forward to you duly recapturing top honours.

We also note the achievement of Mark Eves (13,590) who makes the jump straight from Sage up two ranks to Master. Well done to him!

Candidate Masters Ten players made the move from Sage to Candidate Master, with some 14 players moving the other way. In fact 11 players gained elevation from Sage, but as noted earlier, Mark Eves’ great season saw him jump up not one but two ranks to Master.

We also congratulate the following six novice-ranked whose performance over the season earned them elevation to the rank of Candidate Master, bypassing sage level. Well done to: Lawrence Cook (8,210), James Skinner (7,187), Aidan Linge (6,421), David Cowan (5,942), Aaron Linge (5,889), and Pete Daniel (5,663).

And finally…We can’t let the season pass without noting the very sad loss of three fellow quizzers, all friends who passed away during the course of the season. These were Mike Abbott, Neil Phillips, and Dick Cribb. We remember them fondly. RIP gents.

NEW SEASON STARTS WITH THE BRITISH QUIZZING CHAMPIONSHIPS ON 1 SEPT. (Note: due to Euston station's closure, the BQC will be a multi-site event with Coventry still as the main venue. Details are on QUEST. This event will have the Brows rather than the Pairs as a result of the change.)